Democrats join U.S. House Benghazi probe they deride as politics

Democrats named five lawmakers to the U.S. House select committee investigating the deadly 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya.

Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi took the advice of senior lawmakers who said it would be better to have people in the room for hearings that Democrats have criticized as overtly political, rather than boycott them entirely.

The ranking Democrat on the panel will be Elijah Cummings of Maryland, the top Democrat on the Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Other members are Representatives Adam Smith of Washington state, the ranking Democrat on the Armed Services Committee; Adam Schiff and Linda Sanchez of California; and Tammy Duckworth of Illinois.

Congress started investigating the Benghazi attacks less than a month after they occurred on Sept. 11, 2012, calling attention to the Obama administration’s initial claim that the violence stemmed from “spontaneously inspired” demonstrations over an anti-Islamic video.

Officials later said attackers with links to terrorist groups stormed a diplomatic compound and set fire to it. That attack, and another one hours later at a CIA annex, killed U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans.

The House voted 232-186 to empanel a select committee to investigate the attacks and the White House’s response, which Republicans have called a cover-up.

Democrats have said the panel is politically driven, designed partly to damage Hillary Clinton, a potential presidential candidate in 2016 who was secretary of state at the time of the attacks.

Pelosi, who has been critical of past House inquiries for not adequately including Democrats in decisions, met yesterday for an hour with House Speaker John Boehner to discuss terms of participation in the panel.

Representative Trey Gowdy, a South Carolina Republican and former prosecutor who will lead the panel, said in an interview yesterday that its seven Republican members will hold an organizational meeting this week.